


Pretty Fly for a WiFi

by TrueInitiate



Category: Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M, Pre-Relationship, boy do I sure love being in 2012 again, everything’s happy, i have no idea what this is, maybe a gratuitous amount of cursing but hey, no pain, sorry if this is trash lmao
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-30
Updated: 2019-04-30
Packaged: 2020-02-10 14:49:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,653
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18662578
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TrueInitiate/pseuds/TrueInitiate
Summary: Bucky was absolutely not prepared for the dreaded WiFi stealer to be his hot neighbor but hey, life happens.





	Pretty Fly for a WiFi

**Author's Note:**

> This is a Non-Powered AU (I never thought I would write one of these bc they’re not really my usual cup of tea but I digress). Also Endgame, what Endgame? It’s still 2012 just with Bucky, Peter, Vision, Sam, and Scott what are you talking about??

“Again? Fucking again?”

 

“Buck, maybe dial down the language?” Steve called from the other room, the absolute hypocrite. Bucky could hear the slight laughter in his best friend’s voice, and normally he would be all in for teasing right back but currently he had more pressing matters to attend to- like the fact that their fucking Internet was being slow as fuck again.

 

Bucky slammed his head against the back of the couch in an effort to stop himself from doing something stupid, like throwing his laptop across the room. All he wanted to do was register for his classes before everything he needed was filled up, but apparently the powers that be decided that was too much leeway to give him and that he deserved to suffer instead. Nothing really new, but it didn’t make the situation any less infuriating.

 

“When’s Nat supposed to get here and check out our connection?” Bucky asked Steve, trying and failing to keep his voice from being petulant.

 

“In about thirty minutes or so Buck, she texted me a few minutes ago and said she’d be running late because of traffic,” Steve replied, walking into the living room and giving Bucky a sympathetic glance. The effort was mostly wasted because Bucky could tell Steve was still laughing internally about the frustration Bucky was showing at the moment. Like any mature adult, Bucky responded by flipping him off and throwing a pillow at his face. Steve squawked as he batted the projectile out of the air, sticking his tongue out at Bucky in the process.

 

“Steve, I’ve got to get this done. I can’t keep my scholarship if I don’t have a full schedule, but that’s not going to do me much good to keep it if I have to waste a semester taking classes I don’t need. They all fill up fast as fuck and I am not willing to suffer more than I already do,” Bucky groused, throwing his head back again and staring morosely at his laptop screen, which was still stuck on the same page it had been for nearly half an hour now. The loading bar was still moving, just slower than molasses. It’s not the first time something like this has happened. A couple weeks ago, Bucky had been waiting for an online bid to open for a collector’s baseball signed by a member of the Dodgers. He had planned on doing his best to get it, and if he succeeded then it would become Steve’s birthday present in a few weeks. But he never even got the opportunity to throw in his hat for the ball- the site took almost an hour to load, and by the time it did the bid was already over and Bucky had missed his chance. That wasn’t the only incident; for months now their internet has been incredibly slow, although only recently up to that standard. They basically gave up on watching Netflix or Youtube, having to go to Redbox and put up with Clint laughing at them during movie night. Bills also now had to be paid the old-fashioned way, and Bucky was tired of the lady at the bank judging him for coming into the front wearing his sweatpants and ratty as fuck tank top he’s had for about seven years now. If Bucky wasn’t allowed to be mopey and lazy at home, then everyone else had to put up with his trash gremlin look.

 

Bucky knew that there were plenty of worse problems to have, and at least it was this and not their water or their electricity. The problem was that if it were one of those, Bucky and Steve could have already had if figured out and solved. They weren’t stupid, but neither of them were the best when it came to tech and honestly, they had no idea why they were having so many problems. They’d talked to their provider and had it confirmed that there were no connectivity issues, but they never called them back because frankly their customer service was awful and Bucky could easily tell that they would say nearly anything to just get them off their backs. Both Bucky and Steve had taken to carefully monitoring their usage, and it was all in the range of what they should be able to handle. Finally, after a couple months of stress and nearly broken electronic equipment, Steve suggested they ask Natasha for help. Bucky agreed, because Natasha was scary competent at basically everything and would probably be at least able to point out what was happening even if she couldn’t do anything herself.

 

That didn’t make Bucky any happier at the moment though. He knew those 30 minutes were going to drag on longer than any previous, and he groaned again as he slouched further down on the couch. Steve came over and patted him on the knee in commiseration, then shoved Bucky over so that he could sit down too. He turned on the tv and flipped over to the news, sipping on a glass of lemonade. At that moment Bucky felt the most intense, irrational dislike of Steve he ever had in his life. Which wasn’t much, because he loved his brother-in-all-but-blood more than anything, but sometimes Steve annoyed the fuck out of Bucky. Punk knew it too, if the sly looks and the smirk were anything to go by. Bucky shoved Steve back, just for the sake of it.

 

“Punk,” he huffed, stealing Steve’s glass and taking a swig for himself.

 

Steve chuckled and gently knocked his shoulder against Bucky’s, accepting the glass back after Bucky was done with a smile. “Jerk.”

 

Whining, Bucky fell over to lay his head against Steve’s side, not finding the position very comfortable since Steve had developed a frankly alarming amount of muscle mass in the last few years but unable to gather the willpower to move to a more comfortable position. “Steve,” Bucky pouted, flinging his right arm around his friend’s middle and squeezing him tightly. “Steve I think I’m losing my goddamn mind, I absolutely can’t miss getting into Dr. Grand’s class Steve I fucking can’t!”

 

Steve made a sympathetic noise in the back of his throat and patted the top of Bucky’s head gently. “I know Buck. Even if it gets full before you can register though, I’m sure you can email her and ask if she can add you to the roster anyway?”

 

Bucky groaned, burying his face in Steve’s side even more. “Yeah but I really would rather not have to socialize with anyone if I can avoid it, you know that Stevie. I’d just start panicking and put it off for forever and then I’d never be in the class.”

 

“Let’s hope Nat can help us out quickly then,” Steve replied, for once not trying to wheedle Bucky into confronting his problems head on and dealing with them, for which Bucky was grateful. He understood that his inability to really talk to people he didn’t already know caused a lot of problems, and some days he was even able to work on that, but most of the time it just sent him spiraling with panic until he couldn’t think straight at all. He definitely didn’t need that on top of all the other stress he was already experiencing. He’d decided to go back to school several months ago, since he was discharged from the army and he had all those scholarships and grants just sitting there for him to take advantage of. He wasn’t sure what field he would be trying to get into exactly, but he knew he had a year or two before he really had to buckle down and pick a major. But if he had to take bullshit classes, which he didn’t need, then it would just fuck up his entire schedule and several of his scholarships, all of which he needed in order to continue going to school. Bucky felt he was entitled to whining, at least until Natasha arrived and he’d have to act like a responsible adult.

 

He and Steve watched the news for the next half-hour (the loading bar making a bare few centimeters of progress during that time) even though it never failed to make them both incredibly angry and sad all at once. They were fortunately knocked out of their news spiraling by a knock on their front door, followed by a loud and cheerful, “Open up fuckers it’s us!”

 

“Oh no, not fucking Barton!” Bucky made sure to yell loud enough for the two out front to hear as he got up to open the door for them.

 

“Fuck you too Barnes!” Clint rejoined cheerfully, Nat looking fondly exasperated at his side. He held up several boxes of pizza while Nat held up a case of beer. “After we brought goodies and salvation for your ungrateful ass too, shit!”

 

Bucky laughed and stepped out of the way, allowing his two friends to enter his and Steve’s house. Steve was already in the kitchen, getting out paper plates and napkins for all of them to use. Clint swaggered in like he owned the place, leaving Nat to bump shoulders gently with Bucky as she passed him by to place the beer on the counter.

 

“What were you two even planning on doing for dinner, actually cooking? Disgraceful, you two are bachelors and need to live like fucking gremlins like the rest of us,” Clint said, eyes widened in faux affront as he gazed around their clean kitchen.

 

Natasha rolled her eyes and flicked him on the side of the head. As Clint pouted and rubbed where she’d got him, she said, “Honestly Clint, you shouldn’t be proud of the fact that you managed to make a slice of pizza grow mold in the pattern of a pair of boxers.”

 

Bucky shuddered as he opened up a pizza box and grabbed a slice of pepperoni. “Please let’s not talk about that abomination of nature while we have all this perfectly safe for consumption pizza right here.”

 

“Agreed,” Steve said, popping open a beer for each one of them. Clint stuck out his tongue but didn’t reply, already shoving a slice into his mouth as fast as he could.

 

For a while the only sounds in the kitchen were of the four of them chewing and sipping their drinks. Soon enough, however, even Steve and Bucky had eaten their fill, and the topic of conversation turned to what they had called Natasha there to do.

 

“Nat you have to save us, please,” Bucky whined, slouching as far down in his chair as he possibly could.

 

“Please Nat, Bucky might actually die of melodramatics otherwise,” Steve said, clasping his hands together in supplication while just barely repressing a smirk from taking over his face. Bucky threw wads of paper napkin at him in retaliation.

 

Natasha rolled her eyes, but a fond grin was quirking the corner of her lips. She got up and made her way over to the living room where Steve and Bucky kept their router, the guys trailing behind her like a bunch of lost ducklings. “So you’re sure that your provider can’t do anything to help you?”

 

Bucky huffed and settled his hip against the wall, watching Nat as she crouched down and took a look at the box. “They were absolute dicks Nat, even Steve couldn’t put up with them more than once.” Steve, standing right beside his roommate, nodded his head in agreement.

 

“No shit?” Clint asked, one eyebrow raised. “That’s kinda fucked up, I’d apologize for giving you guys shit for having to use Redbox on movie nights but also I’d rather die than apologize for taking advantage of teasing the fuck out of you.” Both Bucky and Steve flipped him off in response and Clint put a hand over his heart as he gasped in faux affront. “Why, I never!!”

 

Before Bucky or Steve could respond to Clint’s dramatics, they were interrupted by Natasha standing back up and humming to herself. She turned around to face the guys again and asked, “Did you guys ever pick a password like I told you to do?”

 

Bucky avoided her eyes while Steve’s grew larger. “Oh fuck, I completely forgot about that!”

 

“Language Steve,” Bucky couldn’t resist mumbling out, even through his own embarrassment. Clint cackled and held his hand up for a high-five that Bucky returned while Steve rolled his eyes at the two.

 

“But what does that have to do with our connection being slow Nat?” Steve asked, getting them back on track. Natasha crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow at him.

 

“Don’t you remember? I told you that if your WiFi wasn’t password protected, it would be super easy for someone to use your connection without you knowing unless you actively looked for it. If they’re downloading or streaming really large amounts of data, that would explain why it’s slow.” She walked over to the couch and sat down, pulling Bucky’s laptop onto her own lap as she did. “I’m just going to check really quick to make sure that’s the case, but I’m almost positive that’s what’s happening.”

 

Bucky, Clint, and Steve exchanged looks while Nat did whatever she had to do on Bucky’s laptop. It was only a couple of minutes later when she let out a triumphant noise and waved the others over to her. As they gathered around her like it was some sort of strange show and tell, Natasha pointed to the screen. “See? Those are all the connections actively enabled to your network right now. All of our phones plus Bucky’s laptop are there, but also someone we don’t know at all. Tracking the IP address showed me that it’s coming from the house next door.”

 

“So one of our neighbors is stealing our Internet?” Steve asked, eyebrows furrowing.

 

Natasha nodded and stood to her feet. “Yep! Now we just need to confront them about it, though since it’s your connection in the first place you or Bucky should be the ones to talk.”

 

Steve opened his mouth to volunteer himself for the endeavor, when Bucky reached over and placed his hand over Steve’s mouth. “I’ll do it,” Bucky said firmly, before starting to make his way to the front door. Steve spluttered a bit before catching up and placing a gentle hand on his friend’s shoulder.

 

“Are you sure about this Buck? I can do it, it would be no trouble.”

 

Bucky shook his head and stood his ground. “I don’t feel anxious about this at all Steve, I think my anger at the situation is giving me confidence to actually go over there and do something about this. I need to use this motivation while I still have it. Which house is it?” This question he directed to Natasha, who pointed to the right. Bucky nodded in response and finally exited the house, the others trailing behind him as he marched over to their next-door neighbors’. They had never really interacted before, and Bucky knew nothing about them at all. He didn’t understand how someone could steal like that, and then do so much of it that it affected the speed of their connectivity as a whole. He also felt more than a bit embarrassed since, apparently, this whole situation could’ve been avoided if he and Steve had just put a password on their network to begin with. Instead they’ve spent the past two months incredibly frustrated with not being able to use their Internet like they were supposed to be able to, and all Bucky wanted to do now was get the whole situation over with.

 

Once Bucky had made it to their neighbors’ door, he made sure to knock nice and loud on it. He glanced over his shoulder at his friends, and they all gave him a thumbs up or an encouraging smile to show that they had his backs. Bucky inhaled a shaky breathe before sterling himself as he heard the front door begin to open. He turned back around, ready to let loose his angry but still polite tirade (it wouldn’t do to get too angry too soon) when all of the breath was suddenly known led out of his body and he had to stand there with his mouth hanging open as he stared st the man before him. Dimly Bucky was aware of the fact that he was staring and he should probably stop soon, but the majority of his focus was taken up by the absolute Adonis just two feet away. Tan skin was framed by a head of slightly curly black hair, a couple of grey streaks only serving to heighten the entrancing beauty of it. It looked so soft and all Bucky wanted to do was sink his hand down into it and hear what kinds of noises the man made in response. His golden brown eyes were surrounded by a thick crown of eyelashes, making it almost look like the man was wearing eyeliner. He had nice (kissable! Bucky’s mind supplied) lips, slightly chapped but still so alluring. He was on the shorter side, but Bucky could also tell that the man had more than the average amount of muscle on him, and honestly at this point Bucky’s mouth was dry.

 

Mr. Perfect quirked one eyebrow at Bucky. “Um, can I help you?”

 

Bucky swallowed a couple of times, and glanced at his friends for help again. They all made go-on gestures at him, though he could see the hints of laughter and resignation in their eyes as well.

 

Turning back to the man, whose other eyebrow had joined the first, Bucky took a deep breathe and then blurted out, “So hey we know you’ve been stealing our Internet but honestly that’s completely okay please keep using it if you want I’m sorry to bother you.”

 

Behind him Bucky could hear Steve and Clint making choked noises in response to his statement, though Bucky’s own eyes were glued to the man in front of him. His eyebrows had furrowed in confusion, and he tilted his head at Bucky like a puppy which made Bucky almost drop dead on the spot.

 

“Um, sorry, could you run that by me one more time? I don’t think I heard you right,” the man said, and fuck but Bucky wanted to kiss away the crease between his brows and wow he was really getting in deep with a man he just fucking met he’s such a mess.

 

“Um, uh, I said we know you’ve been using our WiFi but it’s completely okay and you can keep using it if you want and I’m sorry to bother you?” Bucky repeated, struggling to speak slowly and loud enough for the man to hear him easily.

 

The man’s eyes widened in further confusion. “What? I haven’t been using your WiFi, we have our own network-“ suddenly the man seemed to have an idea, for he turned around and yelled into his house “Peter Benjamin Parker have you been using the wrong WiFi??”

 

A few moments later a young voice responded, “Uh, what’s the right WiFi?”

 

“Pretty Fly For A WIFI!!”

 

Another couple of moments of silence, during which the feeling of dread and horror Bucky felt in the pit of his stomach deepened, when they all heard an “Oh shit!” echo down from inside the house. Rapid footsteps could be heard coming down a flight of stairs before suddenly there was a young teenager standing beside the man in the front door. “I’m so sorry Tony I thought yours was Drop It Like It’s HotSpot!!” The boy’s eyes were incredibly wide and he seemed genuinely upset at his mistake.

 

The man, Tony, rubbed the side of his temple before sighing and patting the teen on the shoulder. “I’m not mad at you Pete, but you better apologize to these people who’s WiFi you’ve been mooching off of. I’m sorry” he added, looking Bucky in the eyes and giving Bucky the feeling of an impending heart attack. “I bet your connection’s been really slow huh? Pete’s been working on projects that require a hefty Internet connection, I’m sorry if it’s affected you.”

 

“Me too,” Peter chimes in, looking morosely at Bucky with the biggest pair of puppy dog eyes Bucky had ever seen in his life. “I honestly didn’t mean to at all, and I already disconnected from it so you should have no more problems from me.”

 

Bucky had to clear his throat since Tony was still staring at him with his liquid golden eyes, but somehow he managed to croak out, “It’s no problem, really.”

 

Tony frowned and shook his head. “It really is, we’re very sorry about this. The kid’s staying with me this summer while his aunt is taking a well-deserved break, and I should’ve made sure we were both on the same page about that. Oh, sorry, my name’s Tony Stark,” he added, holding his hand out to Bucky and smiling slightly.

 

Bucky reaches his hand out to shake Tony’s in a daze, only managing to remember to say his own name after he felt a slight kick in his shin from Natasha. “‘m Bucky Barnes.”

 

“Bucky huh? Have to admit, not my favorite way to meet a super hot guy but if needs must,” Tony said, actually fucking winking at Bucky while the teenager made a few retching sounds. Bucky paid no heed, since all of his faculties were focused on not short-circuiting after that wink.

 

Behind him, Bucky vaguely heard Steve sigh to himself. “I call all rights to say this story at your wedding,” Steve muttered under his breath.

 

“Fuck, no fair,” Clint mumbled back, before Natasha slapped both of them on the backs of their heads.

 

“Obviously it’s going to be me; after all, I brought them together.”

 

Steve and Clint had to acquiescence.


End file.
